Change is hard. Or is it?

Change can be hard for people in any capacity.  In an organization, change is successful when you have a leader who can guide their staff through the following eight steps.

Step 1 – Produce a sense of urgency for the change

Sometimes change is needed. Other times change is forced upon us. Regardless of the type of change leaders must communicate the change to their staff, the reasoning behind the change and be supportive of the change.

Step 2 – Forming a powerful guiding coalition

A leader’s job is to guide their staff by establishing a clear understanding of the problems and opportunities.  They need to create buy in and establish trust and communication.  The group needs to cooperate as a team to achieve their goals. 

Step 3 – Creating vision

A shared vision needs to be established by the team to guide the change effort.

Step 4 – Communicating the vision

A leader and team need to communicate out the vision through many facets and take the time to help people get on board. To clearly communicate the goals of change, people need to understand why these changes are necessary.

Step 5 – Guiding the new direction by removing obstacles

The team needs to brainstorm any obstacles that may arise and figure out how to work past them to continue moving forward.

Step 6 – Planning and creating progress

This is an opportunity to assess performance and make any necessary improvements.

Step 7 – Improvements occur and produce more change

Instead of declaring victory, leaders of successful efforts use the credibility afforded by short-term wins to tackle even bigger problems.  They go after systems and structures that are not consistent with the transformational vision and have not been confronted before

Step 8 – Ensure sustainability

New approaches are implemented. The changes just become the new “normal.” Leaders look for connections between the changes that occur and new achievements. Lastly, steps are put into place to ensure that organizational success is sustainable.  Education of the leaders of tomorrow helps the change to live on.